


I Remember When You Were Mine

by gaytypo



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Okay I'll be honest there isn't actually like juno content, Other, desparately justifying the third Rita minute as canon, mild season 3 spoilers, the comfort is not kissing if that's what you want
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-12
Updated: 2020-02-12
Packaged: 2021-02-28 01:07:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22675321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaytypo/pseuds/gaytypo
Summary: I promised him I would leave Mars and never return. However, it would seem he was of the mind to break my trust, so I can afford the slightest of deviations myself.
Relationships: Peter Nureyev/Juno Steel
Comments: 5
Kudos: 23





	I Remember When You Were Mine

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah so man in glass < third Rita minute
> 
> Title from Here With Me by The Killers
> 
> Unbeta'd and frankly fresh off the typewriter if you know what I'm saying

There's a thousand sayings in thief circles that speak to a thousand different lifestyles. I have always been in mind of what I believe to be the only proper way for a thief to prosper. There's something to be said about the idea of coming in with sundown, going out with sunrise. You see, when living a life of crime, one must look forward. If thieves could afford to linger— well— they wouldn't be stealing, would they? At least, not at first.

Of course, like all lifestyles, it evolves first from necessity. Stealing. Leaving. Then it becomes habit. And habit becomes necessity again. And you don't remember who you've left behind because leaving is just what you always do, no matter who is left to feel it.

But when you get left?

Do not think; simply follow habit. 

When my dear Juno wasn't there, the body did not allow the brain a chance to ask why. It simply kept moving and didn't look back.

When the brain caught up, months later in a similar enough hotel bed with a quite dissimilar individual, the recollections began.

  
  
  


There were many nights and many planets and they all reminded me of the detective that got away. Sometimes it felt like a cold bitterness. Like the freezing floor of an ancient martian cell. Or perhaps, the sharp ice of a blade, or the electric chill administered as punishment for a proficiency out of your control. Cold torture was many of my times with Juno.

Sometimes too I will remember the thrill of escape. The first time I found myself imprisoned with Juno Steel, it was at the hands of Cecil Kanagawa. The next was at Juno's hands, a delectable surprise of cuffs and wits. Both of these invoke a different sensation, deep beneath the surface of my memory. The heat of a plasma cutter edging out a narrow victory. The warmth of a kiss more fated than either of us knew to know.

How, though, can I omit the escape to dash them all? When I left Juno in that cell, it could have been so easy to end the memories there. Trick and use him as a distraction, as a tool, buy my own freedom from his pain and never turn back. Hindsight knows that what would've happened was no great apocalypse. Even then, past me didn't really care about the future of Mars. No, I didn't end it with a cruel escape, but with a promise. All because I loved Juno. And in that moment we both had to trust one another so damn much. It is that force which got us out.

And I have many recollections about all that came after.

But none of them escape the ticking of the unchanging past which always leads to Juno walking away between the curtains of the night, too ashamed even to tell me of his cowardice. Nor could he check if I was truly asleep, denying me even the smallest of reliefs that I wouldn't have to keep recalling that final moment and those final steps again and again.

I promised him I would leave Mars and never return. However, it would seem he was of the mind to break my trust, so I can afford the slightest of deviations myself.

Travelling to Mars, where I find myself now, is certainly amongst my dumbest of decisions. I would qualify it as 'when it comes to Juno,' but it feels incorrect. I don't know how to frame my choices to express that my worst idiocy can _only_ come to fruit with Juno in the equation. All the time I spent watching stars blink by on my way back, I was forced to think of him. Who else?

What else to dream of but his lopsided smile in dour moments when he finds just the depreciating joke to make. It is only expected that I might replay his voice saying the name only he knew in the private moments of a partnership I had never and probably will never experience the same again. And I see the shadows and lights of a dangerous train heist against his worried temple. Close my eyes, all that appears is a beauty by my side, finding the one element to bust it all open while I bet my name and thus my life on his success. 

So much of myself is his, this is inevitable. That's why not just a bouquet of dahlias and roses could cut it. This is why I had to do the most foolish thing of showing up to Mars, in person, just to get the slightest edge of a reunion in unspoken gesture and seeing him from afar and proximity. 

Part of what makes it so incredibly stupid of me is that I'm still confused. I don't give flowers as a grand statement to say "you're forgiven" or "I still love you" or "my offer still stands". I thought about writing these and they weren't true to my feelings one bit. I am still furious. I am heartbroken and devastated and still completely infatuated. My ambivalence for Juno is a deep and complex beast of many shapes. It is an amalgamation of memories and sensations. I experience the good and the bad over and over because _all of it_ is my time with Juno. All of those moments are how I feel for him.

It is foolish to want for a future where I can make more moments with him and clarify these feelings somewhat. I am at my absolute worst when it comes to him.

And a thief cannot be so foolish all of the time. So, for now, I will place it in a little box. I will wrap Juno up and shove him into a new closet of the mind. I will ignore this gigantic space I have been forced to make. Unfortunately, being obsessed with his impact upon me makes for an inefficient thief. So this box will become a standard, out of sheer necessity. Necessity may become habit. My stubborn mind may become used to its ways and forget that this is only a temporary solution. 

If one thing is for certain with Juno Steel, though, the fates cannot be _goaded_ towards or away from my path with his. Perhaps one day, we will meet again, and I can go into my closet of repression, open up my little box, and sort my feelings into something more cohesive and _deserving_ of what happened between the great detective and the master criminal.


End file.
